Feds not shrinking from protecting public

Vince Li, the man who murdered of Tim McLean aboard a Greyhound bus in Manitoba, is pictured in this August 5, 2008 file photo as he was being escorted by officers on his way to a court appearance in Portage la Prairie, Manitoba. (QMI Agency files)

Is it Montreal Dr. Guy Turcotte who stabbed his two children to death in 2009 and was found "not criminally responsible," the psychiatrists who said he was fit for release after only 46 months, or the system that actually cut him loose in December?

And what about Greyhound bus killer Vince Li, already on supervised leave from his Manitoba psychiatric hospital after being found "NCR" (not criminally responsible) for one of the most unimaginable murders in Canadian history: the 2008 stabbing, beheading and cannibalization of Tim McLean, a fellow bus passenger whose only crime was being asleep in a nearby seat?

Who's insane in that one?

Is it Li? Is it the shrinks at the Selkirk Mental Health Centre outside of Winnipeg who think they can cure him, if and only if he doesn't go off his drugs again? Or is it the system for putting the testimonial guesswork of shrinks ahead of public safety?

While short on details, Justice Minister Rob Nicholson this week announced the drafting of legislation which could see NCR killers like Turcotte and Vince Li kept behind bars indefinitely.

This is purposeful legislation, a let-the-facts-speak proposal that will trump the bleeding-heart liberalism of the mental health industry that contends even the worst of the possessed can be rehabilitated and released without fear for the public.

This legislation will also propose harsher penalties and longer jail terms for child predators -- again, long overdue -- and a Victims' Bill of Rights that will finally bring the forgotten to the fore.

As Nicholson put it, "We plan to ensure that sentencing takes into account each young life that has been devastated by a sexual predator." While psychiatrists exist who believe they are miracle workers, there is no empirical evidence of a cure for pedophilia, just as there is no cure for the deranged who decide to walk away from their medications.

Locking up the worst of the worst until they leave in a box is the only way to categorically prevent re-offending.

Neither Turcotte or Li deserve any sympathy or any freedom, and nor do the pedophiles who defile our children's innocence and devastate their lives.

Feds not shrinking from protecting public

Is it Montreal Dr. Guy Turcotte who stabbed his two children to death in 2009 and was found "not criminally responsible," the psychiatrists who said he was fit for release after only 46 months, or the system that actually cut him loose in December?

And what about Greyhound bus killer Vince Li, already on supervised leave from his Manitoba psychiatric hospital after being found "NCR" (not criminally responsible) for one of the most unimaginable murders in Canadian history: the 2008 stabbing, beheading and cannibalization of Tim McLean, a fellow bus passenger whose only crime was being asleep in a nearby seat?

Who's insane in that one?

Is it Li? Is it the shrinks at the Selkirk Mental Health Centre outside of Winnipeg who think they can cure him, if and only if he doesn't go off his drugs again? Or is it the system for putting the testimonial guesswork of shrinks ahead of public safety?